Alexander Pope Quotes on Love (27 Quotes)

And is there no relief for Love?

In Men, we various Ruling Passions find;
In Women, two almost divide the kind;
Those, only fix'd, they first or last obey,
The Love of Pleasure, and the Love of Sway.

Line after line my gushing eyes o'erflow,
Led through a sad variety of woe:
Now warm in love, now with'ring in thy bloom,
Lost in a convent's solitary gloom!

What are you to Love?

Love, free as air, at sight of human ties, Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.

How vast a memory has Love.

Yet here for ever, ever must I stay;
Sad proof how well a lover can obey!

Hope humbly then; with trembling pinions soar;
Wait the great teacher Death; and God adore.

Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state,
How often must it love, how often hate!

Heav'n first taught letters for some wretch's aid,
Some banish'd lover, or some captive maid;
They live, they speak, they breathe what love inspires,
Warm from the soul, and faithful to its fires,
The virgin's wish without her fears impart,
Excuse the blush, and pour out all the heart,
Speed the soft intercourse from soul to soul,
And waft a sigh from Indus to the Pole.

Yet then, to those dread altars as I drew,
Not on the Cross my eyes were fix'd, but you:
Not grace, or zeal, love only was my call,
And if I lose thy love, I lose my all.

Is it, in Heav'n, a crime to love too well To bear too tender, or too firm a heart To act a lover's or a Roman's part Is there no bright reversion in the sky, For those who greatly think, or bravely die.

Oh teach me nature to subdue,
Renounce my love, my life, myself--and you.

On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore, Which Jews might kiss and infidels adore.

Too soon they taught me 'twas no sin to love.

There stern religion quench'd th' unwilling flame,
There died the best of passions, love and fame.

And if I lose thy love, I lose my all.

Ah let thy handmaid, sister, daughter move,
And all those tender names in one, thy love!

When souls each other draw,
When love is liberty, and nature, law:
All then is full, possessing, and possess'd,
No craving void left aching in the breast:
Ev'n thought meets thought, ere from the lips it part,
And each warm wish springs mutual from the heart.

The jealous God, when we profane his fires,
Those restless passions in revenge inspires;
And bids them make mistaken mortals groan,
Who seek in love for aught but love alone.

Once like thyself, I trembled, wept, and pray'd,
Love's victim then, though now a sainted maid:
But all is calm in this eternal sleep;
Here grief forgets to groan, and love to weep,
Ev'n superstition loses ev'ry fear:
For God, not man, absolves our frailties here.

No woman ever hates a man for being in love with her, but many a woman hate a man for being a friend to her.

Is not absence death to those who love.

How the dear object from the crime remove,
Or how distinguish penitence from love?

Provoking Daemons all restraint remove,
And stir within me every source of love.

So very reasonable, so unmov'd,
As never yet to love, or to be lov'd.

Now warm in love, now with'ring in my bloom Lost in a convent's solitary gloom.